My heart bleeded, girl

This is my story for popsoundboard's Brave Author challenge. I had more fun with this than I should have, maybe. I was thisclose to going for the MPREG prompt, dear Anonymous Reader, but went with this instead. I can never resist Trickyfish. So, Lance/Chris: current day, NSYNC* reunion fic, touring and sharing a bus, sex would be awesome in the story is what we have here.

NKOTBSBWTF? [Chris/Lance, rated R-ish, 2770 words.]





Joey paced back and forth between the entertainment center and one of the couches in Justin's humongous living room, looking uncannily like his father as he waved his arms around. Lance blinked to clear his vision and Joey looked like himself again, or at least a little younger and a little slimmer than Joe, Sr.

And maybe with slightly more hair.

"Now? Now's when we're doing this? With NKOTBSBWhatTheFuckEver out there touring already? Donnie Walberg has his own TV show, for crissakes! With Tom Selleck! All this time, we've been waiting, and now - who's going to come see us?"

Joey seemed a little more worked up about an NSYNC reunion tour than Lance would have expected. "Hey, we have a ton of fans that'll come see us, Fatone," Lance said, offended on their own behalf.

He was sitting on the other couch between Chris and JC, while Justin struck a pose in front of his wall of bookcases, which were filled with more Grammys and Emmys and Moonmen than books. Lance tried not to be gratified at the absence of any Oscars.

"We're doing it now because J's having a mid-life crisis," Chris explained kindly, ignoring Justin's indignant squawk. "And who gives a fuck about Donnie Walberg's TV show?" He flapped his hands in Justin's direction. "Hello? Justin Fucking Timberlake here." He cocked his head and considered Justin thoughtfully. "Now, he's a real celebrity."

"Does he have cheese, like, everyday?" Lance asked snidely. He was still bitter that Wade had sung his part on that song.

"Shut it, Bass," Chris snarled, socking Lance in the shoulder. "I'm trying to make a point."

"Ow, what the fuck, Chris? What the hell is wrong with you?" Lance said, rubbing his shoulder and glaring at Chris.

"Gotta get you back in touring shape, Lansten," Chris snickered. "Want me to kiss it better?" When Lance glared even harder, Chris just grinned. "Okay, back to the point. Justin -"

"The point being," Joey said, finally sinking down into the vacant couch, "Is that I have two children and career plans of my own –"

Lance rolled his eyes. "You were thisclose to doing dinner theater in Tampa, Joe. Don't exaggerate."

Joey flipped the bird in the direction of Lance's pinched-together fingers, which were demonstrating just how close Joey'd been to Man of La Mancha. Lance shuddered. Singing The Impossible Dream while people ate prime rib and drank weak martinis was not his idea of a good time.

Joey was still whining. "I'm just saying –"

"Thirty is not mid-life, Chris," Justin interrupted loudly. "You can't have a mid-life crisis at age thirty. I'm not gonna die when I'm sixty, OKAY?" Justin closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "I'm not having a mid-life crisis," he repeated, and Lance was impressed at how sincerely Justin seemed to believe himself. "I just thought it might be fun."

"Fun." Chris shook his head fondly and Lance knew he was behind this all the way. Lance could feel the old excitement creeping back into his veins. "Your definition of fun always was a little fucked up, Justin."

"Are there going to be buses?" JC said suddenly. He looked a little pale. "Because if there are going to be buses, I want my own." There was a determined set to his chin that made Lance scoot a little closer to Chris on the couch.

"Aw, what's the matter, C?" Chris asked. "Me 'n J too much for you?"

If anything, JC turned even paler. "I'm not riding on a bus with you and Justin again, Chris, and you can't make me." He paused and looked wildly around at all of them. "No one can make me."

No one even seemed inclined to argue with him. "You can have your own bus, JC," Chris said and Lance reached out a tentative hand to place a soothing pat on JC's knee.

Chris tilted his head at Justin. "We all can, if we want. As a matter of fact," he went on, and Justin started to get that defensive look that used to mean that Lance might as well find something else to do with his time, because Justin wasn't going to back down no matter how long it took, and neither was Chris. "We can have whatever we fucking want. Right, J?" Chris asked and his smile was a little dangerous. "And if I want to share a bus with you, I can, right?"

"Wait, what?" Lance said, startled.

Justin cleared his throat. "Yeah, about that." He crossed his arms over his chest and stared down at his shoes. "I'm gonna be flying in for most of the dates," he said really fast, looking away from JC, whose eyes were narrowing as Justin spoke. Lance slipped his hand off JC's knee and moved a little closer to Chris.

Justin swallowed at the expression on JC's face. "It's just that I have to do all this promo for the movies, and I'll be in New York and LA a lot, and then there's SNL, they've been after me…"

"Saturday Night Live?" Joey brightened, sitting up straight. "We could all –"

"Let me get this straight," Chris said, ignoring Joey. "You're going to be so busy promoting a movie you made with your ex-girlfriend, plus a movie you made with the chick from That 70's Show, which has the same plot, by the way, as the movie that guy from That 70s Show made with Princess Amidala, who was in the ballet movie with the chick from That 70s Show, that you'll be flying in and out of this tour like some kind of visiting dignitary?"

"Ashton Kutcher is more than that guy from That 70s Show," Justin huffed.

"That's what you took away from that?" Chris asked, staring at Justin in amazement.

"No, it was a pretty impressive rant, actually," Justin said, smiling disarmingly, the kind of smile only an idiot would trust. Lance was pretty sure none of them were idiots, current evidence to the contrary. "I hear you, but I don't really have much of a choice, Chris." A brief look of regret passed over his face, but Lance didn't trust that any more than his smile.

"If your time is so valuable and you're too important to actually tour with us while we all go on tour, explain to me why we're talking about this again?" Lance said.

Chris bumped him with his shoulder. "Because it's gonna be fun." He grinned up at Justin, who relaxed and smiled back. "You know it is, so everyone shut the fuck up and let's talk set list."

"So I can have my own bus?" JC asked again, like he just had to be sure.

"Yes, JC," the rest of them said in unison. "You can have your own bus."

Lance thought they sounded pretty good together for having been out of practice for so long.

*

So JC got his own bus, Chris and Lance got their own bus, and Joey and his girls were on another one, while Justin flew in and out of their lives like a hummingbird on speed. Joey and Kelly brought along a tutor for Briahna and it was almost like old times.

"Bus school," Chris groused. "You'd think after the way you and Justin turned out, Joey'd be smarter than to let his kid go to bus school."

"Excuse me?" Lance said. "I turned out just fine, thank you very much."

"Yes, you did," Chris leered. "Very fine indeed." He waggled his eyebrows.

"Don't do that," Lance said. "It makes you look like a dirty old man."

"I am a -" but Lance shut him up with a kiss.

"Mmfph," Chris said, as he planted his hands in the middle of Lance's chest and shoved. Lance wasn't as easy to move as he looked – he'd been working out a lot in preparation for the tour.

And for sharing a bus with Chris.

So Lance didn't go very far when Chris pushed and Chris's eyes narrowed with what Lance hoped was lust but figured was just annoyance. "What the matter with you?" Chris asked indignantly.

"What's the matter with you?" Lance asked him right back. "You're not fucking me in the tiny, miniscule kitchen of our bus. That's why there's a big ol' bed in the back, Christopher."

"Miniscule, huh?" Chris said, grabbing Lance's wrist and tugging him down the narrow passageway to the bedroom. "Maybe you didn't do too badly with bus school if you know big words like miniscule."

"You'd better hope I don't have cause to use it once you get your pants off," Lance said as they reached the bedroom. Not that you could really call it a room, as such. It was mostly a bed, with barely enough space around it for them to navigate. Joey had to walk around it sideways, the one time they were stupid enough to let him back there.

"Why do two short guys such as yourselves need a bed this fucking big?" he'd asked, smirking at Justin, sharing the joke with him like being tall was so fucking awesome.

It was one of the rare times Justin could spare them five minutes offstage and they were all getting drunk on Lance and Chris's bus.

JC threw himself backwards on the bed and giggled. "It would have been awesome to have beds like this back in the day, wouldn't it?" He sighed. "The things we could have done."

"The girls we could have done," Joey said. Kelly was back on the Fatone Family bus with their girls, safely out of earshot.

They'd ended up getting totally shit-faced, all five of them passed out in a sprawl on the bed, arriving hung-over and looking like warmed up shit at the venue the next morning.

Johnny had smiled happily when he saw them. Lance figured he was glad to see them getting along well enough to get drunk together. He handed out water and aspirin like it was Christmas morning, herding them into their current version of the Quiet Room with quiet satisfaction.

The tour was going well. Tonight they were driving straight through to Tampa.

Lance and Chris tumbled onto the bed, Lance landing on top of Chris with a muffled "oomph."

"Ow, you fucker, watch my knee," Chris grumbled.

"Are you going to bitch, or are you going to fuck me?" Lance asked while he wiggled around until he'd gotten rid of his pants. Chris shoved at Lance's shoulder until he slid to the side enough for Chris to tug Lance's t-shirt up over his head.

"Get this thing off," he growled. He shook it under Lance's nose. "And why in the hell are you wearing a t-shirt with Justin Beiber's face on it? I'm burning later."

Lance smirked as he yanked Chris's jeans and boxers down his thighs. "Oh, yeah?" He reached under the pillow for the lube and grinned evilly down at Chris.

"Hey, I thought I was gonna fuck you," Chris protested.

"Old men who bitch about their knees get to just lay there and take it," Lance said.

Chris thought about it for a minute. "And you're gonna do all the work?"

Lance nodded.

"Okay, sure. Sounds like a plan." And he worked his pants down his legs and kicked them off onto the floor.

Lance leaned down and kissed Chris, soft and warm, and Chris kissed him back, affectionate and friendly, and Lance felt known. His lips curved in a smile against Chris's mouth and Chris gave his bottom lip a sharp nip.

Lance laughed and pulled back. "Let's get this show on the road," he said, and he slicked his fingers and reached down between Chris's legs.

Chris closed his eyes and scooted his hips further down the bed to give Lance better access. Just a touch of Lance's hand to the inside of his thigh had him spreading his legs, and Lance slid a finger in with a sigh of contentment.

He watched Chris's face, moving his fingers slowly, looking for the reactions he loved so much. Lance never got tired of seeing this, of watching Chris respond to him.

His eyes still closed, Chris craned his neck up and Lance bent and kissed him, hard and wet, moving down to plant small kisses across his jaw and along his neck, while he worked Chris open, got him all wet and ready for him.

He pulled his fingers out and tried his damndest to get himself lined up while not letting go of Chris's mouth. Chris didn't give him much of a choice, wrapping his arms around his neck like a vice, holding him in place.

"Mmph," Lance said. "Chris, let go, let me –" and then he got lucky, managed to slide home, his cock pushing into Chris's heat and Chris moaned into his neck.

Chris wrapped his legs around Lance's waist, pulling him close. Lance grunted and managed to gasp out, "I thought your knee hurt?"

"Shut up and fuck me like you mean it, Bass."

So Lance did.

He was trembling with need by the time he came. He felt like he could never get enough of Chris and the heat pooled in his belly as his hips stuttered and his arms shook. Beneath him, Chris had both hands on his own dick, his eyes desperate.

Chris whispered, "Lance," and shot between them, coating his own fingers. Lance sprawled across Chris and tried to breathe.

"Jesus, you're heavy," Chris complained and shoved feebly at him, but since he was clearly having trouble catching his own breath, Lance ignored the bitching.

"Remember how hard it was to find the time for this, last time around?" Lance asked when he could talk again, snuffling into Chris's neck and getting comfortable.

Chris pushed at Lance's shoulder one more time then gave up and settled down, tangling his legs with Lance's. Lance knew it wouldn't last, knew Chris would get restless, up and moving sooner than Lance wanted, but he let himself relax and take advantage of the moment.

"I remember how narrow those fucking bunks were. And how damn hard it was to get rid of JC and Justin for more than five minutes at a time," Chris said. Lance laughed softly.

"Good times, good times," Chris said drowsily. He sighed and said, "Better get cleaned up, this is some sticky shit."

"Stay," Lance said, both a plea and a demand. There was a moment when it could have gone either way, but then Chris went still under him and Lance let out a breath he didn't know he was holding.

*

And so the tour went on, and they filled arenas in spite of Joey's fears, and they grabbed hold of the parts of Justin he would let them have, and all in all, it was good.

In Chicago, the five of them went to a strip club and Kelly banned Joey from their bus for two days, even after he'd explained that it was a male strip club. He slept on the tiny couch on Lance and Chris's bus because JC wouldn't let him get near his.

In Pittsburgh, Chris played the whole concert wearing a Steelers jersey and waving and grinning at his family in the audience. Lance beamed at him.

In LA, JC spent a couple of nights at his house, and Chris and Lance hid about twenty tiny electronic alarm clocks in his bus, all set to go off at different times, all of them with the most annoying beeps Lance had ever heard. JC was so pale with exhaustion for the next two days on the road that even Chris felt a little bad.

JC got them back in Denver, when he explained with a beatific smile to a local reporter that Chris was limping slightly because he had a prosthetic leg and also that Lance had had pectoral implants the past summer. Her eyes were wide and her smile uncertain when she turned quickly to ask Joey about what it was like having his family on tour with him.

And in New York, they all joined up with Justin to host Saturday Night Live, although it was more like Justin was the actual host and the rest of them were the musical guests. But that was okay and Joey was ecstatic. Even Chris had to admit it was pretty cool.

On the last night of the tour, as they clasped hands and took their final bow together, Lance smiled and said a silent thank you for Justin's mid-life crisis. He hoped he'd have another one before he actually reached middle age.